It is well known in the agricultural industry that applying agricultural products such as seed and fertilizer to field areas where the agricultural products have already been applied in a previous pass over the area by the implement is undesirable and various equipment and systems have been developed for reducing the size of these overlap areas. Wider seeding implement now commonly have sectional control systems whereby the delivery of agricultural products to sections of the implement that are in overlap areas is stopped, and then restarted when the sections move back into unseeded field areas.
When product flow to overlap areas is stopped however, the furrow openers remain engaged in the ground disturbing the products that were placed in the previous pass. Seeds are particularly sensitive to such disturbance as it is desirable to press the seeds into close contact with moist soil to promote germination, and so disturbance by a subsequent pass of the engaged furrow openers is detrimental to germination and eventual crop yield.
This problem of disturbance is addressed in U.S. Pat. No. 7,690,440 to Dean, et al. which discloses a seeding implement with furrow openers attached to mounting arms that are movable from a raised transport position to a lowered operating position. The mounting arms and attached furrow openers are laterally spaced across the width of the implement and divided into laterally adjacent sections. A sectional control system stops the flow of agricultural products to sections that are in an overlap area, and also automatically raises the mounting arms in the section to the raised transport position when the flow of agricultural products to the furrow openers in the section is stopped. When the furrow openers in a section are raised, the drag forces exerted by the implement become unbalanced as drag forces are reduced on the raised side compared to the side not raised and so the implement moves forward at a slight angle. This skewed orientation changes the row spacing of the seeded crop and can adversely affect yields.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,578,870 to the present inventor Beaujot addresses the problem of disturbing previously planted seeds by mapping a field to determine overlap areas prior to seeding, and then stopping application of the agricultural products on the first pass of the seeding implement through the overlap area and then applying the products on the second, and final, pass through the overlap area. Skewing is avoided since all the furrow openers always remain in the ground, and are raised and lowered together.